If Aleksander Barkov misses time, how could Florida Panthers fill his lineup spot?

The Florida Panthers’ immediate focus postgame Thursday was the status of captain and top-line center Aleksander Barkov, who sustained a lower-body injury after crashing feet first into the boards trying to protect an empty net in the final minutes of the team’s eventual 3-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators.

Panthers coach Paul Maurice didn’t have an update postgame on Barkov, who had to be helped off the ice and didn’t appear to be able to put any weight on his right leg.

But with Florida continuing its four-game road trip on Saturday against the Buffalo Sabres, Maurice needs to figure out a contingency plan with his lineup should Barkov not be out.

It’s not an easy task considering everything Barkov does for the team. The 29-year-old is the reigning winner of the Selke Trophy given to the NHL’s best defensive forward and is the Panthers’ franchise leader in games played (739), goals (266), assists (446), points (712) and game-winning goals (48), among other categories.

That said, here is a breakdown of potential options for the Panthers to maneuver through the immediate future should they need to.

Cap space

The Panthers have two open roster spots, so they can add players to the active roster.

However, they do maneuver through their salary cap situation to make those additions.

According to PuckPedia, the Panthers’ currently only have $556,970 in cap space. Players on league-minimum salaries count as a $775,000 hit to the salary cap.

The easiest way for Florida to add cap space temporarily would be to place forward Tomas Nosek on long-term injured reserve. Nosek sustained an upper-body injury at the start of training camp. Panthers president of hockey operations and general manager Bill Zito on Monday said Nosek remains week-to-week “but not next week” — indicating he will be out long-term. A player on long-term injured reserve does not have his salary count against the salary cap but has to sit out either 10 games or 24 days, whichever is longer.

Florida would have just over $1.3 million in salary cap space to work with while Nosek is on LTIR.

Should Barkov’s injury cause him to miss enough time that it would warrant the Panthers placing him on LTIR, they would get $10 million in salary cap relief while he is sidelined, giving them the chance to bulk up their roster with replacements in the short term.

Options available

The Panthers have a handful of options to add to the lineup in Zac Dalpe, Patrick Giles, MacKenzie Entwistle, Will Lockwood and Sandis Vilmanis.

Dalpe is the most experienced center of the group. Giles took reps at center during training camp but finished playing on the wings. Etnwistle, Lockwood and Vilmanis are all primarily wingers.

Forward lines

When Barkov missed time during various stints last season, Maurice moved third-line center Anton Lundell to the top line to fill Barkov’s spot. That’s anticipated to be the move here if needed. Sam Reinhart would most likely remain as the right winger on that line, as Lundell and Reinhart have had success working together before.

The question would be who is the left wing: Carter Verhaeghe or Eetu Luostarinen? The Luostarinen-Lundell combination has worked well over the past three years, and Verhaeghe could easily slide to the second line with Sam Bennett and Matthew Tkachuk — reforming a trio that Maurice has used in the past.

Doing that would make Evan Rodrigues and Mackie Samoskevich the wingers on the third line, with Jonah Gadjovich and A.J. Greer the fourth-line wingers. Jesper Boqvist would center one of those two lines, with a to-be-determined center rounding out the lineup.

In this scenario, the forward lines would tentatively look as follows...

Luostarinen-Lundell-Reinhart

Verhaeghe-Bennett-Tkachuk

Rodrigues-Boqvist-Samoskevich

Gadjovich-TBD-Greer

The other option would be to move Luostarinen temporarily from winger to center, most likely leaving the second and fourth lines intact and leaving the need for a winger on the third line. If that’s the route Maurice goes, the forward lines could look like this...

Verhaeghe-Lundell-Reinhart

Rodrigues-Bennett-Tkachuk

TBD-Luostarinen-Samoskevich

Gadjovich-Boqvist-Greer

Special teams

Beyond 5-on-5 play, the Panthers would also need to figure out how to allocate Barkov’s time on both special teams units. Barkov is part of the top power play group and one of the primary four forwards used on the penalty kill.

Moving Lundell up from the second power-play unit to the top group is probably the simplest solution there, with Luostarinen potentially slotting into Lundell’s spot on the second power-play unit.

When it comes to the penalty kill, Luostarinen and Lundell form one of the forward duos, while Barkov and Reinhart have formed the second. Greer has been the next most commonly used forward so far this season on the penalty kill, so he’ll likely get the first crack to work with Reinhart if Barkov is sidelined.